Prior application U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/228,719, filed on Sep. 16, 2005, by one of the present inventors has dealt with package components for radiochemical sterilization of medical or pharmaceutical products consisting of a hermetically sealed foil pack containing (1) a solid device, as in absorbable sutures and meshes, in a perforated holder or a liquid formulation in a sealed, flexible dispenser, as in absorbable cyanoacrylate-based tissue adhesive; (2) a microparticulate, unstabilized polyformaldehyde as a source of radiolytically generated formaldehyde encased in a sealed pouch comprising a porous, non-woven or woven fabric; and (3) a nitrogenous compound capable of reacting with residual formaldehyde, such as melamine or urea, that is encased in a sealed pouch comprising a porous, non-woven or woven fabric. However, only a small fraction representing less than 3 weight percent of the microparticles of unstabilized polyformaldehyde used to produce formaldehyde gas radiolytically was responsible for releasing the sterilizing dose of the formaldehyde gas. This leaves more than 95 percent of unused polymer mass. Such behavior may be attributed to the establishment of equilibrium between the monomeric and polymeric formaldehyde, which compromises the efficiency of the formaldehyde precursor. This provided an incentive to pursue the study associated with the instant invention, which entails the use of (1) a cyclic, thermodynamically less stable formaldehyde precursor compared to the linear polymeric polyformaldehyde described in the parent application; (2) an organic polymeric microparticular dispersant that lowers the mass of the active gas precursor per unit volume in the package insert, which facilitates the gas diffusion and minimizes the overall mass of the precursor; and (3) an organic granular desiccant dispersant, which not only lowers the mass of the precursor, but also acts as a desiccant to maximize the shelf-life stability of the sterilized absorbable device.